#22 - Spring 2012

flanders

TAKE 22 | spring 2012 | e 3.99

UnlEAshing

toon’s top dogs Walking the Dog

the Artists

storytelling in the Age of Transmedia

Time of My Life

Koen De Graeve

Transformation Artist

All About

Anemone VAlcke risinG star

VincEnT BAl gErT EmBrEchTs clAUDE lEloUch mAnU richE mATThiAs schoEnAErTs ilsE somErs pATricE ToyE Tim VAn AElsT FrAnK VAn mEchElEn

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Quote ‘it almost feels like having the honour to represent your country at the world championship. But then without a nice sports shirt.’ michaël r. roskam on the Foreign-language Academy Award nomination for Bullhead interview by inge schelstraete in “De standaard” – 25 January 2012

WWW.FlAnDErsimAgE.com I TAlEnT mATTErs

c ntent i Take 22

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‘matthias schoenaerts is a chameleon actor whose potential is enormous,’ say the people who have the tremendous joy of working with him.

Anemone Valcke is like a precious flower. With each new film, she shows another aspect of her beauty and skills. she now has her first lead in Peter Monsaert’s debut Offline which will come out later this year.

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‘i enjoyed myself a lot,’ says patrice toye about shooting her third feature, Little Black spiders, a ‘story about friendship’, which is readied for a late summer release.

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eric goossens and Anton Roebben are heading what is probably the largest and most ambitious independent animation company in Belgium, Walking The Dog.

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koen de graeve loves to make transformations.

For his lead role in nic Balthazar’s highly anticipated Time of My Life, he dropped from around 90 to 71 kilos.

the artists is one of the most ambitious transmedia projects made in europe to date. Director Hans Herbots and producer and driving force peter de maegd explain.

in Germaine, Frank Van mechelen takes us back to the early 70s, seen through the eyes of a young woman in her late teens.

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manu Riche’s documentary snake Dance is a story about two men in the New Mexico desert, Aby Warburg and J. Robert oppenheimer.

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although far from autobiographical, allez, eddy! chimes with certain events in director gert embrechts’ own childhood.

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Producer and director tim Van Aelst on the succes of Benidorm Bastards that recently won the international emmy for Best Comedy.

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‘i always had this love-hate relationship with film, because it’s so hard to find your way and get your projects made,’ says Ilse somers who is about to complete her feature debut, seaside rendez-vous.

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2 Quote Michaël R. Roskam | 6 i-opener Ipu, So I Say | 11 shortissimo Oh Willy… | 50 Influence vincent Bal | 52 Icons | 54 Fans Claude Lelouch | www.flandersimage.com Talent Matters

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gloBAl in 2011. BUllhEAD mADE iTs inTErnATionAl DEBUT AT ThE BErlin Film FEsTiVAl AnD WAs lATEr sElEcTED As BElgiUm's cAnDiDATE For ThE 2012 ForEign-lAngUAgE oscAr. mEAnWhilE ThE 34-yEAr-olD clAimED his FirsT sUBsTAnTiAl English-lAngUAgE pArT in ThE Us rEmAKE oF loFT, ThEn A lEADing rolE in FrEnch

people

ChAMELEON ActoR

ThE cArEEr oF FlEmish AcTor mATThiAs schoEnAErTs WEnT

For JAcqUEs AUDiArD in rUsT AnD BonE. BoTh Films ArE DUE oUT in 2012. teXt IAn mundell

iLLustration kARl meeRsmAn

Those who have worked with schoenaerts are immediately struck by his presence as an actor. loft director Erik Van looy recalls his earliest appearances as a child actor, playing opposite his father Julien on stage in The little prince. 'Even then you could see that he had a magnetic presence,' he says. The same was true of his small early roles on the big screen, in films such as Any Way The Wind Blows, Black Book and A girl. 'Every time he was there he lit up the screen.' michaël r. roskam, who directed him in Bullhead, says the same thing. 'you feel it immediately, he has this kind of DNA that all great actors have.' Their first meeting was for Roskam's 2005 short film The one Thing To Do. During the casting session, the director watched schoenaerts on the screen of a small video camera. 'There was already a transformation. something happens and you can't really capture it. it's like being photogenic, but it's also in the movement. i just felt it immediately.'

They worked together to develop Jacky, the central character in Bullhead. 'This character was great on the page, but you could see that a bad actor would destroy it,' roskam says. 'matthias gave me confidence, through the way that he works and because I knew he would make it happen. his dedication is 200 per cent, and that shows.'

The physical transformation that Schoenaerts made for the film, gaining 27 kilos and pumping up to body-builder proportions, was backed with detailed work on the character's primal state of mind. 'he prepares a great deal in advance, and thinks about every little detail of the character,' roskam says. 'he has this package in his head and he can open it and use it on set.'

Van Looy had a similar experience directing Schoenaerts, first in the original loft and then in the Us version, The loft. 'he thinks about it a lot and talks about it a lot, but once on the set he just goes for it,' Van looy says, comparing him to a boxer. 'As a boxer you have to think, of course, but you have to decide really quickly what to do. And that's what he does.' his breakthrough in France is down to agent rosalie cimino at the UBBA Agency, who offered to represent him after seeing Bullhead. That role, and others in loft and pulsar, made a strong impression on her. 'He stands out for his charisma and refined acting skills,' she says. 'The way he works to build a character is comparable, in my opinion, to the use of chiaroscuro in painting. There is great nuance and great power at the same time.' cimino had been in contact with Audiard's casting director for several weeks when she saw schoenaerts and had a strong intuition that he should meet the director. she made the introduction, but Audiard is notoriously demanding in his choice of actors. 'in the course of his working meetings with the director, it was matthias' talent which made the difference,' she says. she sees further possibilities for schoenaerts to work in Belgium, France and beyond. 'matthias is a chameleon actor whose potential is enormous. his acting range and the fact that he speaks English perfectly may well seduce international directors.'

Van looy agrees. 'he's got it all for an international career. he's ready for it, but whether he wants it is another matter.' he expects schoenaerts to choose movies that are close to his heart. 'i'm sure he won't pop up in Transformers 4, but he will do a movie like A history of Violence. i think he's an actor with an edge, and he'll look for material with an edge.' roskam hopes his friend will get a chance to work with some of the great international directors. 'if martin scorsese discovered him, i'd be curious to see whether he would still work with leonardo Dicaprio. if i was leo, i would watch my back with matthias coming.'   Bullhead is nominated for this year's Foreign-language Academy Award

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iPu, SO i SAy Set in Transylvania during the Second World War, the local authorities of a small village must find the person responsible for the death of a german soldier. otherwise the nazis will execute all of them.

There's no way to find the guilty one, but there's Ipu, the madman of the village, whom they promise a hero's funeral if he claims responsibility and agrees to die in their place. he must decide, and time is running out.

A burlesque comedy, ipu, so i say is directed by Bogdan Dreyer and stars harvey Keitel, gĂŠrard Depardieu, laura morante and hubert Damen. Flemish partner in this rumanian-Belgian-german co-production is Tomas leyers of minds meet (lost persons Area, Blue Bird). ď Š www.flandersimage.com

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risinG stAR sTill A sTUDEnT, AnEmonE VAlcKE hAs BEEn ExTrEmEly ForTUnATE WiTh ThE pArTs shE hAs lAnDED. hEr shorT lisT oF crEDiTs inclUDEs inTErnATionAlly AcclAimED TiTlEs: sUch As moscoW, BElgiUm AnD oxygEn, As WEll As Bo. in pETEr monsAErT’s FEATUrE DEBUT oFFlinE, shE TAKEs A nEW sTEp in hEr Blossoming cArEEr. shE plAys ThE FEmAlE lEAD. TExT lIsA bRAdsHAw

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drama with comic elements in Offline, which is scheduled to open this autumn, Valcke plays a university student who works on the side for a sex-cam website. ‘she thinks she’s a very independent and mature girl, who rationalises doing the work to pay for school. she’s just a normal student who does everyday things, but when she works, she turns into a totally different person.’

A bit like acting? yes, says Valcke, but ‘she’s not aware that she’s doing it. she thinks she’s untouchable, like she’s not vulnerable. But she really is. she has the need to be loved – by her parents, for instance, but she still pushes them away.

That’s why i was really interested in the role – because she’s full of contradiction.’

The film is definitely a drama, but not without comic elements.

Flemish actor Wim Willaert, a character TV and film actor known for his roles in Ex Drummer and 22nd of may, plays an ex-con who comes across Vicky on the internet. ‘he’s a very comical kind of actor, both on the set and off,’ says Valcke, ‘so some of the dialogue is funny; it’s a beautiful balance in the script.’

very lucky Valcke compares working with writer/director peter monsaert to working with christophe Van rompaey on moscow, Belgium. ‘christophe is very good at directing actors,’ she says. ‘he feels it; he has a lot of passion around it. peter is also an actor, mostly in theatre, so he is also really committed to the actor.’ she realises she’s been very lucky with the parts she has landed in her short career. ‘Because i’m still studying, i’ve had the advantage of being able to choose the parts I find most interesting,’ she says. ‘At this point, it’s not really about the money but about the projects. I didn’t know that the films i’ve done would be so internationally successful – that just comes with the territory. I’m very grateful that those films were so well received.’

Offline, like moscow, Belgium – in which Valcke played the outspoken daughter of a 40-something woman dating a 20-something man – was shot in her home town of ghent. Both directors also come from ghent, and it is also home to Valcke’s mother, who is a stylist for television and film. ‘She was Oxygen – 2010 more concerned than happy for me that i wanted to be an actress. she suggested that i study psychology at university,’ Valcke smiles. ‘it’s true, Flanders is a small place to do this job. But i decided when i was eight years old that i wanted to be an actress, and i staged scenes to act out with friends Moscow, Belgium - 2008 and for my parents. i was really busy with it.’

As she is now. After our conversation, Valcke is off to the city of mechelen to shoot a comedy sketch show for television, starring mostly women. To air later this year, the show features some of Flanders’ finest actresses, including Els Dottermans (love Belongs to Everyone) and gilda De Bal (The misfortunates). it’s exceptional company to be in, and ‘it’s very fun to do,’ says Valcke. ‘i did the pilot last year, and the rehearsals have been a really good time.’ in fact, Valcke could use a good time right now, as she’s still missing her film ‘family’ after wrapping Offline last autumn. ‘i felt a real sadness when shooting on Offline finished,’ she says. ‘You can fall into a bit of a black hole when a film project ends because you miss seeing this one group every day; you become like a big family. But i never felt like that when a project ended before.’  www.flandersimage.com

www.lunanime.be

d i scover y

Anemone Valcke’s list of film credits might be short, but it could hardly be more impressive. As a teenager, she landed her first film role in director Christophe Van Rompaey’s moscow, Belgium, which went on to screen at cannes critics’ Week, winning the sAcD for screenwriting, the AciD/ ccAs distribution prize and the grand rail d’or in 2008. This was followed by a small part in hans herbots’ Bo. Then in 2010, she was cast opposite the lead in hans Van nuffel’s oxygen, which, since its grand prix and Jury Award at montréal, has gone on to win 15 prizes worldwide, including a Best Actress in a supporting role for Valcke at the Flemish Film Awards.

That was all it took for Flemish director peter monsaert to cast Valcke as the lead in his debut feature Offline. The now 21-year-old is set to become one of Flanders’ leading ladies, in a role that is a far cry from her smart and sassy characters in her previous films. ‘i’m really nervous about what people’s reaction to it will be,’ says Valcke from her home in ghent, where she was born and raised and is still attending the KAsK Academy of Arts. ‘i’ve never played the main character in a film, and I’ve never put so much of my heart and soul into a role. i’m going to feel very vulnerable when the film opens. Sometimes when i think about it, my heart starts racing!'

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Henri Storck

DvD & BlU-Ray collection

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henri Storck (ostend 1907 - Brussels 1999) lived through the whole history of cinema, passing from silent to sound, and from experimental to commercial films. he is recognised as a pioneer of Belgian cinema and a key figure in documentary. an eyewitness of his times, he made socially engaged films, but also poetic and experimental short films, films on art and a fiction feature. cinematek pays homage to henri Storck with 4 titles, each containing the films on DvD and Blu-ray in the same package. the first title, Images d'Ostende, contains 8 films on his native city of ostend of which he was the official chronicler in the 30's. the second title, Misère au Borinage, presents three 'social' films from the same era. the last 2 titles, Symphonie paysanne and the documentaries on art, will be released at the end of 2012.

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Royal Belgian Film aRchive inFoRmation : www.cinematek.Be/DvD

shor t i ssimo

Oh WiLLy...

Texture has a special role in the animated short film oh Willy..., which was selected to compete at the Clermont-Ferrand international short film festival in January. The puppets and sets are made of wool, felt and other fabrics, from fine llama fleece to old couch stuffing. This gives the film a soft, tactile atmosphere that complements its strange and touching story.

Fifty-something Willy, plump and ill-at-ease, returns to the naturist community where he grew up to visit his dying mother. This brings back memories, not all of them pleasant, which build into an emotional crisis when his mother finally passes away. Distraught, he wanders in the woods at night, coming face to face with his fears, but also finding an unusual source of comfort.

oh Willy... is directed by Emma De swaef and marc roels, who developed their distinctive style with Zachte planten, De Swaef's graduation film from the Sint-Lukas academy in Brussels. The 17-minute film is produced by Flemish stop-motion specialists Beast Animation, in collaboration with Vivement lundi and polaris in France and il luster in the netherlands. ď Š

www.flandersanimation.be

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DirEcTor pATricE ToyE is spEEDing Up. ThErE WAs A 10-yEAr gAp BETWEEn hEr DEBUT

rosiE (1998) AnD hEr sEconD FEATUrE noWhErE mAn (2008). noW, AFTEr A FUrThEr ThrEE yEArs, shE’s AlrEADy BAcK WiTh A nEW FEATUrE. liTTlE BlAcK spiDErs is A proJEcT shE hAs BEEn mUlling oVEr sincE 2003, WhEn shE FirsT hEArD ThE sTory ABoUT A hospiTAl ATTic WArD in lommEl WhErE prEgnAnT TEEnAgErs coUlD hAVE ThEir BABiEs IN SECRECY. ‘THEY CAME FROM EVERYWHERE IN THE COuNTRY.’ THIS WAS IN THE 1970S, WHEN ABorTion WAs sTill illEgAl in BElgiUm. TExT geoFFRey mAcnAb

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MOM

The moment Toye first had the idea for little Black spiders, she knew it was very strong but she was determined not to hurry. Taking her time, she wrote the screenplay together with ina Vandewijer. ‘For five years, first very slowly and then quite intensely, we worked on the script. I couldn’t say which word is mine and which word is hers!’ over the seven or so years, they were working on the screenplay, Toye and Vandewijer met ‘victims’ who had had their babies taken away from them. They investigated the story of the sister who turned the ward into a profitable business, selling on the teenage girls’ babies for adoption. They worked out just where in France the girls were actually taken to give birth. ‘in Belgium, there is no way of giving birth anonymously. The name of the mother of the baby is always registered,’ the director explains.

story about friendship A generation on, several young adults are looking for the mothers who were forced to abandon them while the mothers are asking what became of them. on the face of it, this was grim material. lives were destroyed as a result of what happened in that ward. Toye was very aware that Scottish director Peter Mullan had covered similar subject matter in his Venice Golden Lion winning film The magdalene sisters (2002), about supposedly promiscuous teenage girls in ireland who were sent to the magdalene Asylums, where they were brutally treated by nuns. however, little Black spiders is not intended as a dark social realist exposé in the vein of Mullan’s film. Instead, Toye had set out to make a film about teenage friendship and camaraderie.

‘I wanted my film to stand on its own, not to be a documentary and not to be sensational or make accusations,’ the director declares. ‘most of all this is a story about friendship.’ little Black spiders has two main characters: roxy, who doesn’t want a baby at all, and Katja, an orphan who by contrast longs to be a mother. The teenagers become firm friends. Neither is a victim.

They make their own choices and are determined to stick by them. The film is intended to be highspirited. After all, its protagonists are adolescents, ‘crazy, with hormones and everything, changing

nter view i quickly from girls to being women.’ in the ward, the girls were treated fairly well. The food was good.

There weren’t severe punishments. many of the pregnant teenagers were from wealthy middle-class backgrounds. Their parents had paid large amounts for them to be allowed into the ward and then to have their babies in secrecy. The idea was that they would then resume their old lives without anyone knowing where they had been.

struggling with identity Casting was an exhaustive process. ‘I saw so many! I saw 500 girls,’ the director recalls. The filmmakers advertised everywhere. They did ‘wild castings’ with big groups which Toye would winnow down. she had eight different girls to choose. ‘i was looking for pretty much everything.’ personality types ranged from the rebellious roxy, ‘kicking against the pricks,’ to the proud but conformist Katja and all the other girls in the ward. ‘It’s a bit of everything. It’s really one big flower with many different petals.’ The cast is led by newcomers line pillet and charlotte De Bruyne.

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Little Black Spiders

Toye won’t explain the significance of the title. Audiences will have to watch the film to work that out. however, she acknowledges that little Black spiders has thematic overlaps with her previous work. ‘yet again, i am dealing with people struggling with identity.’

As soon as the girls arrive at the ward, they’re given new names. They’re thrown into a new world where they need to find their feet.

humour and pathos little Black spiders marks a reunion between Toye and producer nino lombardo of prime Time, who also worked with her on rosie. The director expresses her delight at being back with lombardo. ‘it’s like coming home.’ He is one of the most prolific and adventurous producers in Belgium with credits ranging from Unspoken to The invader (which he co-produced). The co-producers on little Black spiders were iDTV and Versus.

This was a film that had a straightforward gestation. Everybody Toye pitched seemed curious and enthusiastic about the project. They warmed to the film’s combination of humour and pathos. Leading Benelux distributor Cinéart came on board early on to handle the Belgian release of the film.

The crew had nearly worked with Toye before. her cinematographer richard Van oosterhout is also her husband. ‘We’re 25 years together now and so it’s very easy in the sense that it just takes a look and we’re watching the same influences together.’ Other crew members were also trusted confidantes. ‘I worked with the same people… i mixed people i trust very much and who have become a family with the new experience of all the young girls.’ shooting went smoothly. ‘i enjoyed myself a lot… instinctively, the story wants to tell itself. The cast was magnificent – to see them walk away with your lines and make them better: that is the power of creating.’

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One important influence on the film was Peter Weir’s picnic At hanging rock (1975), a period piece about the mysterious disappearance of some schoolgirls at a remote beauty spot in rural Australia. ‘The first 20 minutes of that film, not much happens but there is an atmosphere created of the bubble that those girls are in that i found so particularly beautiful.’ Another inspiration was Sofia Coppola’s equally stylized study of femininity, The Virgin suicides (1999). ‘But then, we did our own thing. We created our own world within that attic,’ the director recalls. ‘in that attic, since they have nothing to do and don’t have to study, they have fun… until the bubble bursts, they have a lot of fun! They do crazy stuff.’ little Black spiders was largely shot at a disused old psychiatric unit which the filmmakers were able to customise as a makeshift studio. Toye used 35mm. She felt that film could capture the intimacy and hidden world of the teenage girls better than digital.

Toye has some influential champions, among them German director Wim Wenders with whom she is in touch regularly by email. Wenders was head of the jury in sundance

nter view

Wim Wenders

Little Black Spiders

‘i wanted my film to stand on its own, not to be a documentary and not to be sensational or make accusations. Most of all this is a story about friendship’

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nter view i Little Black Spiders

Family ties When Toye made rosie in the late 1990s, it was one of the very few Flemish films to travel widely on the international festival circuit. now, there is a wave of young Flemish directors who expect to have their work shown all over the world. Toye may have started earlier than directors like Fien Troch, Felix van groeningen and michaël r. roskam but she feels she too is part of the new movement in cinema in Flanders. As a teacher at sint-lukas, she is well placed to see young talent emerging.

‘They’re not scared anymore. They just take that little camera and they go in the streets,’ Toye says of her students. ‘There’s a lot of talent. They don’t treat me like i am the old teacher. There is a feeling of give and take… the feeling of young against old has gone a little. i feel connected to Fien Troch, to Dorothée van den Berghe, to Felix van groeningen… We like each others’ work.

It’s great what is happening and we all benefit.’ She adds that alongside the new wave of directors, there are editors, cinematographers and sound technicians who strive for the very highest standards. ‘The family is getting a bit bigger. it is still a small family but we are all making very high quality films.'

when nowhere man won the sundance/nhK screenwriting Award. Toye has continued to cross paths with him at other festivals from sao paolo to Venice. Does she admire him? ‘come on, the man has made masterpieces!’ she declares. ‘it’s nice to see somebody who keeps going.’

Like many filmmakers in Belgium, Toye combines directing with teaching. That demands some tight scheduling so she can set aside enough time to make her own movies. she argues that teachers are still working. ‘They have to be doing stuff themselves and to be fresh and on the ground working. i get respect from my students because i am also working. i am like them, looking how to do things.’

With little Black spiders being readied for summer 2012, it’s time for Toye to turn her head toward new projects. no, she won’t divulge details of what she is doing next. she does say she is keen to work again with ina Vandewijer and that they have various ideas in mind. in the meantime, she is putting the finishing touches to little Black spiders. ‘once i am in the editing room, i feel i have to slowly take distance from my child, which is always a little bit painful… i think it is the toughest moment for me because I have to say goodbye to a film in a way.’  www.flandersimage.com www.prime-time.be

PATRiCE TOyE (°1967)* (2012) – LiTTLE BLACk SPiDERS (2008) – NOWhERE MAN (1998) – rosie * selected filmography

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Eric Goossens (l) and Anton Roebben (r)

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toon’s TOP DOgS Eric goossEns AnD AnTon roEBBEn go BAcK A long WAy. ThE TWo principAls oF WAlKing ThE Dog, noW onE oF BElgiUm’s lEADing AnimATion compAniEs, grEW Up in ThE sAmE rEgion AnD BoTh goT ThEir sTArT in ThE Film BUsinEss morE ThAn 20 yEArs Ago. AnD noW, 20 yEArs on, ThEy’VE rAcKED Up An imprEssiVE lisT oF crEDiTs, WorKing As linE proDUcErs AnD co-proDUcErs on hiTs sUch As EUropAcorp’s smAsh, A monsTEr in pAris. AT WAlKing ThE Dog, BUsinEss sAVVy, innoVATion AnD crEATiViTy go hAnD in hAnD. TExT geoFFRey mAcnAb

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in the early 1990s, little Big one was a fertile breeding ground for top Belgian animation talent. As roebben recalls, one of his colleagues at the company was Ben stassen (sammy’s Adventures: The secret passage) with whom roebben made the first CGI 3D ‘thrill ride’ movie, The Devil’s mine, which became a huge success in theme parks all over the world and won numerous awards at animation festivals.

At Trix (owned by D&D), they worked on more simulation ride movies, commercials and visual effects for feature films. goossens however eventually grew tired of the repetitive nature of the work and left to set up his own documentary company, off World. A short time later, he bumped into roebben and together they founded a brand new animation company, Walking The Dog. ‘The main reason we started together on our own was that we’d be able to select our own projects and to embark on new challenges,’ says roebben.

projects.’ Roebben and his team flew out to Montreal, where chomet was working on The Triplets as Walking The Dog acted as trouble shooter on the film.

Both men relished collaborating with an idiosyncratic director of the calibre of chomet, who ultimately became a good friend. Their work on The Triplets of Belleville underlined the fact that Walking The Dog was capable of managing creative and complex technical demands on big and prestigious productions.

‘We ended that production with a very nice feeling. it was the first time we’d been able to apply our knowledge to a highend classic animation,’ goossens recalls.

The film was nominated for the best animated film Oscar in 2003 and had an enormous success and influence in both Europe and the United states.

trouble shooters

After The Triplets, the company moved on to Brendan and the secret of Kells (which also secured an oscar nomination).

Again, this involved working with Vivi Film as part of a big international co-production between Belgium, France and ireland.

After Brendan, goossens and roebben decided they would

Early in the company’s career, they were called in by Viviane Vanfleteren’s Vivi Film to collaborate on Sylvain Chomet’s The Triplets of Belleville. Their expertise in cgi was crucial to the success of that project. ‘For us it was like a gift. This was what we really wanted to do – to work on high level creative

fiscal savvy

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‘the difference from the time of the triplets to now is that, i think, we are now one of the biggest independent animation production companies in Flanders. We are working on both levels - classic animation and CGi’ like to get more creative and production control on their projects. The answer was to take on the role of (co-)producers.

The creation of the Belgian Tax shelter scheme strengthened their hand as they could now also offer international productions access to financing in Belgium.

Their first film as a co-producer was a new version of pinocchio from Enzo D’Alo and renowned art director lorenzo mattotti.

This animated feature, the first 2D paperless drawn title, will be released in 2012. next up was Titeuf: The movie from swiss graphic designer and director ZEp. Their combination of fiscal savvy and creative know-how caught the attention of luc Besson’s Europacorp. Walking The Dog was the Belgian co-producer on the prestige cgi project, A monster in paris, from director Bibo Bergeron (The road to El Dorado and shark Tale), with songs by Vanessa paradis and music by French rock singer-songwriter -M- (Matthieu Chedid). The film remains an important calling card for Walking The Dog. ‘This was a huge challenge,’ admits goossens. ‘if it had gone even slightly wrong, this could have well been our final venture.’ Thankfully, the gamble paid off. Europacorp was happy with their collaboration and the companies now have an on-going relationship.

uncut Ruby

Picnic With Pie

Another project Besson brought to their attention was ruby Tuesday by paul and gaethan Brizzi, the highly acclaimed twin animators who had built up a strong reputation working for Disney and DreamWorks. The story was about a young red-haired single mother trying to survive in new york with her son. The soundtrack would consist of classic rolling stones songs such as 'satisfaction', 'sympathy for the Devil' and, of course, 'ruby Tuesday'. mick Jagger’s Jagged Film was involved as a co-producer.

The prestigious €18 million project was a perfect fit in the company’s ongoing quest for animating complex textures. in addition to acting as co-producer, the Brussels company was offered a lead role in its art direction, which was based on the style of American painter Edward hopper.

Walking The Dog worked for six months on the film before it was (temporarily, it is hoped) shelved, apparently because of creative differences between some of the parties involved.

These things happen.

-file i WALkiNg ThE FuTuRE Walking The Dog is currently prepping Benoit Feroumont’s first animated feature, les majorettes, a co-production with Belgian publishing company Dupuis and prima linea in France. initially a traditional 2D production, it was recently decided to switch entirely to cgi. The idea is to keep it low budget, mainly using animation talent from Flanders and the French-speaking part of Belgium.

The success of michaël and Frederik palmaers’ short nuru, which is screening at clermont-Ferrand, ‘gave us the appetite to support other promising talents,’ explains roebben. Two new shorts are already in the pipeline: From the snow covered hill by mathy Jorissen and Wijnand Johan Driesen, about a boy who’s being bullied at school, and Jan snoeks’ Voltaire, a thrillercomedy about weather vanes.

There’s also sister company off World, which specialises in documentaries. After a first joint venture, the three-part series Kongo, for which Walking The Dog produced about 24 minutes of animation, there are two new projects in which animation is to form an essential part: The Boy is gone by christoph Bohn, and Jan Dirk Bouw’s i love hooligans, in which a football player talks

about his homosexuality. The latter will be done entirely in animation.

Alongside its feature work, Walking The Dog is making various television projects, among them pre-school children’s TV series picnic With pie from veteran illustrator Thé Tjong-Khing, on which they’re partnering with Dutch outfit Submarine and Spanish company Tomavistas. Ketnet for Flanders and Kro are just two of the six broadcasters already supporting the series.

Tuktulik, an animated series which was supported by the casper cineregio project, is in development with partners red Frog star and Dupuis. Described as an eco-sitcom about two inuit youngsters living in an imagined canadian Arctic where magic, traditional spirits and beliefs are still present, it will be produced in 2012-2013.

Kika & Bob ii: The Flight of the pigeon is the highly anticipated follow-up to the first successful series that is still running on 16 channels across the globe. This co-production between submarine (netherlands), superprod (France) and Walking The Dog is to air in 2013. www.walkingthedog.be

Nuru

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A Monster in Paris

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strong reputation

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When a film is in production, Walking The Dog’s Brussels staff grows dramatically. At one stage, there were more than 120 people working on A monster in paris. ‘For an animation business, Brussels is extremely well placed,’ says goossens, pointing out that the city is at the hub of Europe. ‘it’s not only financial, with the Flanders Audiovisual Fund (VAF), the Tax Shelter and other financing opportunities. Like Paris and london, Brussels is one of these places where it is interesting for young people to work.’

But first of all you have to be involved in creative interesting projects. The company has now reached a position where it can afford to be selective about the work it takes on and goossens and roebben will bide their time until they come across a project that sparks their passion. As goossens says, ‘The difference from the time of The Triplets to now is that, i think, we are one of the biggest independent animation and production companies in Benelux.’ roebben believes that the company is now slowly moving towards the next chapter in its young history: being involved as the lead producer of a project. however, he sounds a note of caution. Although the Tax shelter scheme has undoubtedly boosted the animation industry, financing an entire animated feature in Belgium remains extremely difficult. ‘We know that, much more than with live-action films, in order to produce a successful movie one needs to find strong co-production partners in Europe,’ he says, noting that even a powerhouse like EuropaCorp can’t make its films in France alone but also needs to bring in foreign partners.  www.flandersanimation.be

spin-offs With each project, Walking The Dog tries to shift its boundaries, for example by introducing new production techniques or by developing and testing innovative graphic tools. The latter are developed together with partners in spin-off companies they set up together.

Aquavere, for instance, is a company that specialises in animating painting techniques ranging from water to oil paint. it has been working closely together with Walking The Dog on productions such as pinocchio and picnic With pie.

Hobsoft develops new tools that make it possible to structure, organise and classify complex data and assets that are generated within the framework of an animated movie. Within an animation project, where there are usually more than two studios working on the animation and with usually over 1,300 shots awaiting validation, it’s vital to be able to index and access data immediately.

Pinocchio

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Actor Koen De Graeve is no stranger to on-screen transformations, but his latest role is something else. It wasn't like hiding behind a large moustache, as he did in

The Misfortunates, or changing his posture. 'I was me, totally me, but I was ill. I was dying.

Emotionally, that was heavy.'

Text Ian Mundell

Thin Man

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The

Portrait Bart Dewaele

changing appearance he improvised an exercise regime, which took of a few kilos, but then worked with an expert who devised a programme that would get him to an unhealthy weight in time for the shoot. 'it was tough because, in the meantime, i wrote a stage play, we rehearsed it and performed it five nights a week,' he explains. 'yet every morning i had to work out and diet, eating small portions six times a day.'

There was also an impact on his home life. 'A man who doesn't get enough to eat is not always that loveable!' he says. In the end, he dropped from around 90 kilos to 71 kilos.

As well as changing his appearance, losing so much weight altered the way De graeve acted. his energy levels became critical. 'you don't do too much, and you try not to give it all away in one movement,' he says. 'There was not much left at certain moments. i thought i was on great form, but then again everything hurt. i couldn't sit on a chair for more than five minutes because I was really on the bones.' yet at the same time it made an important contribution to the psychology of the character. 'it gave a start of the concentration that i was looking for,' he says.

De graeve stuck to the regime until the middle of the shoot, when Mario's lowest moments were put on film. 'We were shooting scenes where it gets worse and worse, and i didn't want to give in. Then there was a scene with my character's mother, where she washes me in the bath and i have all these wounds from constantly lying down. i broke through the frontier of 72 kilos. That was the first time I thought: this has to stop.'

Even so, he went on for another two days. 'Then nic said: "this is the day you are going to die, and then you can stop."

And it worked, because i was a wreck. it was emotional, because i'd been working towards that point for months and months.' The moment he abandoned the diet also had its hazards. 'They asked me what i wanted to eat, so i said that everyone has to eat with me: Belgian fries, stew and ice cream. i was sick for two days.'

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The film, Time of my life, is a biopic of mario Verstraete, a Flemish man with multiple sclerosis who campaigned for the introduction of a voluntary euthanasia law in Belgium.

In 2002, at the age of 39, he was the first person to take advantage of the new law.

But there is more to the story than mario's campaign to get the law approved. 'it's about two friends who have the same hopes and at a certain time in their lives love the same woman,' says De graeve. 'so it's about love, it's about friendship, it's about family and about the lust for life.'

The need for a real physical transformation was one of the first things he and director Nic Balthazar discussed. 'We agreed that it would be impossible for people to suspend their disbelief so far that they would accept i was really ill and on the edge of dying when i was 102 kilos,' he recalls. 'so i had to lose some weight. lots of weight.'

Time of My Life

physical challenge

'one of the reasons i felt i had to do this film was this question: how do we live this life, knowing that we have to say goodbye at the end, and that our loved ones have to say goodbye to us’

Time of My Life

Filming continued for a further two weeks. With De graeve gradually gaining weight, they filled in events from earlier in the story when Mario was not so ill. 'At the end i could play scenes where my character was still oK. i had to be 15 years younger, and healthier.'

The whole process was much more dramatic than the changes he had gone through for previous roles. 'i've always loved to make transformations, but until now it was with wigs or moustaches and things like that, and acting of course,' De graeve says. 'you try to change how you talk or you react. That's the fun of acting. But this was a totally different ball game. it was really working from the outside in. it was great, but it was heavy.'

The physical challenge of the role was one attraction, but he also had a personal reason for taking it on. 'my mother died almost four years ago, and at the time nic asked me to take the role i was still working my way through everything connected with losing someone who is that close to you,' he explains. 'i thought that it was a unique opportunity to face those demons.' his mother didn't opt for euthanasia, but there was a decision to let her disease take its course, with only palliative care to ease the pain.

'For me that's the same. When you stop treating someone, you say: it's over.'

But death is only part of the story. 'one of the reasons i felt i had to do this film was this question: how do we live this life, knowing that we have to say goodbye at the end, and that our loved ones have to say goodbye to us,' he says. 'i think Time of my life will be a movie that makes something happen. it's not because we have a law on euthanasia that we are all oK with living this life and then ending it.' ď Š www.flandersimage.com www.eyeworksfilm.be

What next?

Koen De Graeve looks for variety when choosing his roles. 'If it comes close to anything else, I'll change it a bit,' he says, 'but always in favour of the story. So if anything comes my way where I think "that's a great story" or "that's a great role", that will be the next thing.'

This was the case with nic Balthazar's Time of my life. 'i read it and it was really vivid, funny and true. it's the most heartbreaking story you could hope for.' Beyond this film, he has nothing certain lined up for the big screen, although he is wrapping up a TV series for Woestijnvis called met man en macht. 'it's about the political intrigues in a very small town,' he says. otherwise he remains active on theatre, particularly through the lazarus theatre group. its latest project is 'What is Drinking?' an exploration of the poetry of inebriation that draws on charles Bukowski's 'pulp' and Venedikt yerofeev's 'Moscow Stations', as well as the group's own reflections. 'It all comes back to the lust for life,' he says.

With Friends Like These, 2007

Cut Loose, 2008

Loft, 2008

Flesh and Bones, TV series, 2009

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Felix van groeningen was the director who got Koen De Graeve hooked on film acting. 'Felix was the first one to come and watch me in a theatre play and say: "i want to work with you,"' he recalls. The result was a part in van groeningen's second feature, With Friends like These. 'i'd done some smaller roles, but that was the first time I felt: this is how it could be. he is very inspiring, very driven.'

When van groeningen asked him to appear in his third film, The misfortunates, De graeve leapt at the chance. 'he really infected me with the joy of acting for the camera, of making a connection, of trying to be in the moment.'

De graeve has also worked twice with Jan Verheyen, on cut loose and crazy About ya, but sees him as a totally different kind of director. 'he's for a broader public, and great fun to work with,' he explains. 'he chooses his actors and says: "it's all yours. go!"'

Working with Erik Van looy on loft was different again. 'The well-known whispering director! he has great eye. he knows when you are not focused or you are not really there. But he doesn't say what you want to hear, he just circles around you a bit, and you know you're not there yet.'

Then there is hilde Van mieghem, with whom De graeve made madly in love. 'she is very annoying. she looks right through you, and doesn't take no for an answer. she knows what she wants, and she won't stop until she gets you there. i like that.' This may have something to do with her being an actor herself. 'she's a great actor's director, and i love to work with her.'

Among the current crop of Flemish directors, De graeve singles out michaël r. roskam, Frank Van mechelen and christophe Van rompaey as people he would like to work with. internationally, the names that spring to mind are David lynch and Jacques Audiard. 'That's a dream,’ he says. ‘Audiard makes devastating movies.'

i

WORkiNg WiTh...

Koen De Graeve (°1972)* (2012) – TiME OF My LiFE (2010) – CRAzy ABOuT yA (2010) – MADLy iN LOvE (2009) – ThE MiSFORTuNATES (2008) – LoFt (2008) – Cut Loose (2007) – WiTh FRiENDS LikE ThESE The Misfortunates, 2009

* selected filmography

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The modern ART Of storytelling

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With a budget of â‚Ź6 million and the involvement of six public broadcasters,

The Artists is one of the most ambitious transmedia projects made in Europe to date. Producer Peter De Maegd and director Hans Herbots are responsible for making sure the result is addictive entertainment as well as a ground-breaking experiment.

Text Ian Mundell

Portrait Bart Dewaele

'The most important thing is to tell a good story, whether that is transmedia or classical fiction,' says Herbots, whose credits include films such as Stormforce and Bo, and the TV series The Divine Monster.

De Maegd agrees: 'The chemistry needs to be there for the audience.'

The impetus for the project came from Swedish broadcaster SVT, which wanted to build on the success of its 2007 'participation drama' The Truth About Marika. For the audience this began as a traditional TV drama about a missing person, but developed a surprise parallel storyline when a blogger (also part of the drama) claimed that the story was based on a real case. This thread was picked up in SVT's current affairs programming and on-line, allowing people to get involved in unravelling the conspiracy.

Together with Flemish broadcaster VRT, which also wanted to explore the possibilities of transmedia storytelling, SVT started to look for other potential partners. In the end, four additional public broadcasters would join the project: Vara from the Netherlands, NRK from Norway, YLE from Finland and TV3 from Denmark.

participative storytelling It was decided early on that a Belgian company would lead the production, since that would allow more money to be raised through the Tax Shelter, the country's tax break for investments in audiovisual production. 'In total about 25% of the finance is through the Tax Shelter,' says De Maegd. 'Without it we couldn't have produced this series.'

The contract was won by Brussels-based Caviar, a production company with experience of both TV series, most notably The Emperor of Taste, and movies. De Maegd was part of Caviar at the time and continues to work with the company as producer of The Artists. But he has also branched out as an independent producer, mainly focusing on transmedia projects. His initiation was Where is Gary?, a project that involved the on-line hunt for a con artist. 'That was my first experiment with truly participative storytelling,' he says. 'The experience was so exciting that I decided it was the road I wanted to continue on.'

nter view i Hans Herbots (l) and Peter De Maegd (r)

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The art world was chosen as the setting for the new project, partly because culture is something that unites the participating countries, partly because it provides a naturally international setting for the characters. There is nothing unusual about a group of artists from different countries coming together and, for the most part, talking in English. On top of that, the partners decided to make it a crime story, a genre that travels particularly well.

The TV drama element of the project will begin with six young artists who decide to pull a stunt. Exactly what this involves is a closely guarded secret until the broadcast date in September 2012, but the stunt goes wrong and they are drawn into a criminal investigation. 'There's a story that unfolds on TV, but also on-line and in reality,' De Maegd explains, 'and through that we create a story world. It's not just something that you consume passively as a TV series, but you can really become a co-character in the story.'

art-themed game

The Artists

'For people who grow up with these new kinds of media, in whose heads the media have already converged, when they start creating stories on a professional level it will be effortless. But the industry, broadcasters and funds need to be ready to welcome them' – Peter De Maegd

The innovation begins with the artists' community in which the protagonists meet. This was created over three days with the cast and 36 live-action role-players. In one sense these role-players are like extras in a traditional drama, but they are also the first participants in the story world, capturing images with cameras and their phones, creating authentic user-generated content.

Their involvement doesn't stop there. 'They stay in character, online, for the next year, most intensively during the period that the series is broadcast,' says De Maegd. 'When you go on-line, you can interact with these characters and that helps us build the story world outside of the TV series.'

As well as interacting with the characters, viewers will also be able to play an art-themed game, although details of that are also secret until the broadcast begins. 'The game play is built around the idea that everyone can contribute something valuable to art simply by gameplay and being creative.’ De Maegd admits that there is a constant risk of getting carried away with the innovative aspects of the project. They have to remember that the TV series remains the core, and it falls to Herbots to ensure that this traditional drama is as strong as it can be. 'It's six artists, and you really need to believe that they are friends who go back a long way together,' says De Maegd. 'That's why you need a director like Hans who has a very good feel for actors. And because of his experience in TV drama, in traditional storytelling, he is also making sure we don't pull the story in too many directions.'

This may seem like a very complicated and expensive way of making a five-episode TV series, but De Maegd takes the long view.

'This effort is not only about five episodes. It's to build experience and to be able to work in a better and more efficient way.'

In the future, this transmedia approach will be a natural way of working. 'For people who grow up with these new kinds of media, in whose heads the media have already converged, when they start creating stories on a professional level it will be effortless.

But the industry, broadcasters and funds need to be ready to welcome them.' ď Š www.flandersimage.tv

viewers will see a series, and they have to see a good series,' he says, 'but for those who want to get involved in the story there is the opportunity to go deeper.'

He came to the project relatively late. 'Normally, as a director, you come into a fiction project quite early, but this one had been going on for two or three years,' he recalls. 'They had spent a lot of time balancing the transmedia elements, and the classical TV drama was one of the last things they started to develop.'

That meant some aspects of the story were off-limits if he wanted to make alterations. 'The script needed some more work, but because of the transmedia character of the project certain things couldn't change,' he says. 'The challenge there was to try to make the story as good as possible without touching the cornerstones that every level required.'

Among his first tasks was to select a cast from the actors put forward by the participating broadcasters. He was looking for a group of people who were similar enough to be credible as friends, yet distinctive enough to stand out in the drama. 'We did casting sessions and auditions for some of the parts, but for others we had a lot of conversations,' he explains. 'At this level, it's no longer about whether or not they can act, but how they fit in and whether we are on the same wavelength.'

Herbots prefers a minimalist style of acting, which fitted well with the Scandinavian approach, as well as that closer to home in Belgium and the Netherlands. However, asking all the actors to perform in English was a risk. 'I was curious to see if that would work,' he says. 'If you bring six people together from six different countries and they speak in English, which is not their mother tongue... I was concerned that it would not come over as a construct. But now that we are half way through shooting, it feels like an organic group.'

It was the chance to explore the international side of TV drama that attracted him to the project. 'It's very exciting working with a mixed crew, mostly from Denmark but also from Belgium. It was also a good opportunity to see how things are done abroad. And I was very curious to work with actors from Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland. The whole context was very intriguing.'

He has been less involved in the transmedia elements of the project, although he will still be busy when the project goes live. 'We will be shooting some extra scenes when the series is already airing, and we will edit them in before the last episode. So we will be very involved next September.'

So far the experience has been a positive one, and he says he would like to do more European storytelling. 'I was happy to find that it works.' But his next project is likely to be a return to the cinema, with a feature film to be produced by Eyeworks. 'It's a Carl Joos scenario. He wrote Dossier K. and The Alzheimer Case, and once again it's a high concept film, it's a very dark film. But I can't say much more than that at the moment.'

From left to right: Tuva Novotny, Teun Luijkx, Viktoria Winge, Elmer B채ck, Thomas Ryckewaert, Johan Leysen, Paw Hendriksony

nter view

Hans Herbots' role in The Artists is to look after the TV drama. 'The majority of

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Guarding the Story

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poweR to tHe people BEING SET IN THE 1970S DOESN'T MAkE gErmAinE A mUsEUm piEcE. 'EVEn noW, 40 yEArs on, iT rEmAins VEry cUrrEnT,' sAys iTs DirEcTor, FrAnK VAn mEchElEn. ThE Film is BAsED on A plAy From ThE pErioD, Which WAs inspirED By ThE AUThor's ExpEriEncE oF A WilDcAT sTriKE. VAn mEchElEn ThinKs ThE qUEsTions oF commUniTy AnD FAmily loyAlTy ThAT iT rAisEs shoUlD sTill rEsonATE. 'i hopE ThAT Things ArE sTill ThE sAmE noW, ThAT pEoplE FEEl A sorT oF soliDAriTy, ThAT ThEy WAnT To hElp EAch oThEr.' TExT IAn mundell Germaine

porTrAiT bARt dewAele

nter view

The story revolves around the Debruycker family. Jan (stany crets) works at a zinc factory in Balen, a small town in the Kempen region in the north east of Belgium. When a strike breaks out in the winter of 1970-71 he is not too keen on taking part, but he is also not brave enough to follow his bitter old father's advice and cross the picket line. With no money coming in, the family has to get by on what his daughter germaine (Evelien Bosmans) brings in from working at the checkout in a supermarket in near-by mol.

But germaine just wants to have a good time and dreams of escaping to a better life. This begins to seem possible when she catches the eye of luc (Bart hollanders), one of the students who have come to the town to show their solidarity with the workers. meanwhile, Jan and his wife clara (Tiny Bertels) begin to see what it means to be part of a community that pulls together.

The Debruyckers are not the kind of family to conceal their emotions, which Van mechelen says is typical of the Kempen region. 'That appealed to me very much,' he says. 'here's a family that can quarrel and shout at each other, but which still loves each other very much.' he thinks that the story could easily have been brought up to date and told as a contemporary drama, but the playwright Walter Van den Broeck was keen to leave it in the 1970s. 'He said: it happened then and we will shoot it like it happened. people will still recognise it.'

Van den Broeck was inspired to write 'groenten uit Balen' (the title is a play on words that defies translation) by his own involvement in a strike. he was working as a teacher at the time and helped the workers write and print flyers. A character with a similar role in the film is played by his son Stefan, while Walter has a brief cameo as a worker.

The play was first performed in 1972 and became a huge success. 'it's one of the most famous plays in Flanders, of all time. it is really something,' says Van mechelen. 'it is put on four or five times a year somewhere in Flanders. Sometimes it is good, sometimes not so good, but the story stands up.'

FRANk vAN MEChELEN (°1966)* (2011) – gERMAiNE (2006) – HeLL in tanGier (2005) – tHe intruDer * selected filmography

www.skyline-entertainment.be

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The idea of filming the play originated with director Peter simons, whose father Jos played the grandfather in the original production. he wrote a screenplay with Van den Broeck, but in 2005 tragedy struck when simons was killed in a motorcycle accident. After that, Van den Broeck turned to his friend Van mechelen to take up the project. 'i read the script and said yes, it would be an honour to do it.'

Van den Broeck developed a new screenplay with guido Van meir, and the project once more moved ahead.

The main change they introduced was to broaden the action. 'The whole play takes place in the living room of the family house and never leaves,' says Van mechelen.

'For the movie it was clear that we had to do something else.' so they made germaine the pivotal character. 'she has a connection with her family, obviously, but also with the strikers and the students. so we built the script around her.'

Van mechelen decided early on that he wanted to keep the local character of the play. 'From the very start i told Walter and guido that i wanted to do it in dialect rather than 'proper' Dutch. it's a very nice dialect to perform in.'

But that gave him a casting problem. 'What i wanted was an 18-year old girl who could talk the Kempen dialect,' he says. 'i think i saw 50 or so girls around that age, but I couldn't find her.' Just as he was considering bringing in a voice coach to work with one of the other candidates, the phone rang. 'The casting was finished, but somebody called me and said: "i have a girl. she's still studying, but i've seen her do some things in school and she is amazing." she was the very very last girl that we tested.'

Evelien Bosmans is originally from mol, the town where germaine's supermarket is meant to be, so she was a natural for the dialect. her acting was also just right. 'she did a beautiful casting session,' Van mechelen recalls. 'she is very impulsive, she's very direct and it was... yes!' most of the rest of the cast are also from the Kempen region, including stany crets, who plays the father. This role demanded toughness, which is how crets is usually cast, but also vulnerability. 'i saw stany in old Belgium, which is a TV series that also takes place in the 70s. That was the first time I'd seen him play such a vulnerable character. Then i had no doubt he could play the father.'

Compared to the casting, finding locations that matched the period was relatively easy. Working class housing in Balen had changed since the 1970s, but a substitute was found in the Zelzate neighbourhood of ghent.

Otherwise, everything was filmed where the original strike took place, right down to the factory. 'We also found the exterior of a cinema that looks exactly like it looked 40 years ago,' Van mechelen says. 'There are places in Flanders where time has stopped completely, and where people are happy to let you film. It's amazing.' ď Š

nter view

very last girl

Germaine

'there are places in Flanders where time has stopped completely, and where people are happy to let you film. it's amazing' unDer ContraCt It's hard to separate Frank Van Mechelen's name from that of Skyline Entertainment, producer of his three feature films and much of his television work.

'I have an exclusivity agreement with Skyline, and almost everything I do is for them,' he says.

The connection began with the TV series stille Waters, after which Van mechelen and screenwriter Ward hulselmans asked skyline's Eric Wirix if he wanted to produce their feature film The intruder. The relationship developed from there.

'We know each other very well, and the better you know each other the more you can say to each other,' Van mechelen says of Wirix. This extends to the creative process. 'We are both very interested in scripts. We like to discuss them and we are not easily pleased, so we can work and work on them until we are satisfied.'

Together with hulselmans, they form a close partnership.

'The three of us are very tight and we can speak openly together. That's very nice.' Their next project is a 12part political thriller for TV called salamander. shot entirely in Brussels, it will wrap in April and air in the winter of 2012-13.

www.flandersimage.com

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tHe DanCe oF De atH

snAKE DAncE is A sTory oF TWo mEn in ThE nEW mExico DEsErT. onE WAs A cUlTUrAl ThEorisT AnD ArT hisToriAn Who WEnT mAD DUring ThE AFTErmATh oF ThE FirsT WorlD WAr. ThE oThEr WAs A physicisT… AnD hE WAs ThE FAThEr oF ThE ATomic BomB. ABy WARBuRG (1866-1929) AND J. ROBERT OPPENHEIMER (1904-1967) CAN BE SEEN AS TWISTED rEFlEcTions oF onE AnoThEr: BrilliAnT, cUlTUrED polymAThs. onE BEliEVED FErVEnTly in ThE hEAling poWErs oF riTUAl, ThE ‘snAKE DAncE’ oF ThE nEW mExicAn inDiAns. ThE oThEr, WhEThEr WiTTingly or noT, UnlEAshED ThE ForcEs oF DEsTrUcTion.

TExT geoFFRey mAcnAb

porTrAiT bARt dewAele

Belgian documentary maker Manu Riche first met English writer patrick marnham when he was making The man Who Wasn’t maigret (2003), a documentary about the pipesmoking, sex-obsessed Belgian crime novelist, georges simenon, the creator of inspector maigret. marnham’s biography of Simenon was the inspiration for Riche’s film, scripted by steve hawes. marnham himself appeared on camera in the doc.

After this initial collaboration, riche and marnham were

eager to work together. riche was keen at the time to make a film about Congo. Marnham was busy trying to write a book about oppenheimer, a project he eventually shelved after he had a disagreement with his Us publisher and discovered that three other books on the same subject were in the work. in snake Dance, we see him making contact by phone with oppenheimer’s reclusive son peter, who seems fascinated by the project but is too wary to want to appear on camera himself.

doc

‘snake Dance is also an essay about documentary making. it’s not solely about the subject. it is also asking how can we talk about something that happened yesterday in the present tense. i am always worried about an audience that is too comfortable!’ - Manu Riche Snake Dance

Indian rituals links between congo and the atomic bomb soon became apparent. The troubled African state was the source for the uranium that was crucial for the bomb’s construction. meanwhile, riche discovered that Warburg had visited new mexico in 1895, long before oppenheimer’s arrival. he had studied the hopi indian 'snake dance' and had become fascinated by its healing power.

‘Warburg slowly became to dominate our film, didn’t he!’ marnham suggests to riche. ‘his ideas were so interesting.’

‘The film is about a real point of view about something we as human beings are missing… that stream of thoughts that was forgotten and almost bombed away in 1945,’ riche agrees.

The indian rituals were the inspiration for Warburg’s celebrated Kreuzlingen lecture in 1923 in which he argued the significance of mythical and symbolical thinking – and demonstrated his own sanity in the process. At the time, he was still incarcerated in a german/swiss asylum.

riche took the decision early on not to use archive footage.

‘I didn’t want to make a historical film,’ he states. ‘The archive is an easy way out for the audience.’ This was not a story that could be put tidily in the past and treated as if it belonged to another era. The effects of the bomb are

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still felt today everywhere from new mexico to congo to Japan.

While researching the film, Marnham decided to write a book on the same subject. ‘it’s a parallel project. it’s not the book of the film,’ he explains. ‘They (the book and the film) are two people’s regards on the same material.

They’re linked – like separated siamese twins!’

Beethoven and Chopin riche and marnham ventured to present-day congo where they discovered western powers still jostling for the country’s uranium and other natural resources. They met illegal miners trying to extract cobalt from underneath a girls’ school.

‘The congo is a complex story in the history of Belgium,’ Riche reflects. ‘I wanted to go to Congo because I wanted to see why Belgium went there in the first place.’

He and Marnham first visited three years ago. At that stage, chaos reigned, even in the capital Kinshasa. When they returned last April, they found improvements but the violence and poverty were still endemic. marnham points to the continuity of exploitation of the Snake Dance

country by western powers stretching back to the time of Joseph conrad’s ‘heart of Darkness’ in the late 1890s.

‘The strange thing is that you can read that book at any time and every time you do, there is a new insight into what is happening today. conrad described the greed that was about to fall on the congo and the determination to strip everything out of it and take it away for our benefit… it is absolutely up to date in that respect. There is a complete lack of mutual interest between those who govern, develop or profit from the Congo and those who live there.’

Alongside the often disturbing congolese footage, snake Dance features classical music and stunning landscapes of the new mexico desert. one paradox riche explores is that oppenheimer and his fellow scientists relished their work together, even if they were ‘working on something like hell.’ They were based in a remote, beautiful location. The intellectual stimulation thrilled them… and yet, they were leaving destruction in their wake. ‘They were listening to Beethoven and chopin up there and yet they knew they were building a bomb.’

As their research continued, the project developed a momentum of its own. The majority of the scientists were opposed to using the bomb on a living target but the army generals and politicians were determined to test it.

deliberate stark quality Earlier in his career, riche worked on striptease, the weekly rTBF television show that used verité-style techniques to tell the stories of ordinary people. humorous, satirical and with a subversive edge, the show established riche’s reputation. snake Dance may be in a different register but shares some of the same observational style. ‘snake Dance is also an essay about documentary making. it’s not solely about the subject. it is also asking how can we talk about something that happened

doc yesterday in the present tense,’ Riche reflects. ‘I am always worried about an audience that is too comfortable!’

Marnham features in the film as a narrator. ‘I didn’t want to be the intrepid explorer going around with the invisible camera crew. i’ve always disliked that kind of performance,’ the English writer says. The idea instead was to combine riche’s eyes with marnham’s voice. ‘it was a style that suited us both very well,’ riche says of the English writer’s interior monologue.

During post-production, marnham’s elegantly written voiceover would often transform the way riche thought about the editing. in turn, marnham would re-think the commentary in response to riche’s montage. snake Dance has been through seven or eight different edits. The film has a deliberately stark quality.

By grim coincidence, the Tsunami and subsequent disaster at the Fukushima nuclear reactor occurred around the time that snake Dance was shooting in Japan. The film is able to draw directs links between what happened at nagasaki and hiroshima in 1945 and last year’s nuclear catastrophe.

polemical undertow The filmmakers are also planning a ‘lecture/performance’ by actor Jerry Killick (monkey sandwich), who will play Aby Warburg giving his historic lecture about the hopi indians. marnham’s book will be published in early 2012.

‘What we are saying in the film is questioning the usual theories about history and the bomb,’ riche suggests. snake Dance points out one key underreported fact: namely that the Japanese were trying to negotiate a truce months before

Snake Dance

the Americans dropped the bomb. it may be essayistic in its structure but it also has a strong polemical undertow.

And what of the 'snake dance' itself? how did it help heal Aby Warburg?

‘The "snake dance" is a ritual,’ marnham explains. ‘Warburg was a classical scholar, very interested in the connections between classical greece and modern red indians. he recognized many of the same impulses in the indian activity as were recorded in greek sculpture and literature. he regarded ritual as an essential step on man’s path toward intelligent reasoning.’ in the face of drought and famine, the dance helped the indians to address their fears. ‘By dominating the symbol of lightning, they could dominate the lightning itself.’

Warburg believed that human intelligence developed from ritual and art. ritual was the cornerstone of reason… and it’s precisely what oppenheimer and his colleagues overlooked when they were building their weapon of ultimate destruction.  www.flandersdocs.be

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rEmEmBEr EDDy mErcKx? ThErE WAs A TIME IN THE 1970S WHEN HE SEEMED TO BE BElgiUm’s VEry oWn AnsWEr To sUpErmAn, A proDigy on TWo WhEEls Who Won ThE ToUr DE FrAncE sEVErAl TimEs. WhEnEVEr hE WAs in A Big rAcE, ThE coUnTry WoUlD grinD To A hAlT. mEn WoUlD croWD roUnD FUZZy TVs in spiT AnD sAWDUsT BArs To roAr him on. his VicToriEs inspirED ThEm AnD mADE ThEm FEEl BETTEr ABoUT ThEmsElVEs. mErcKx’s ExploiTs WErE cErTAinly UpliFTing For ThE TroUBlED yoUng proTAgonisT oF gErT EmBrEchTs’ DEBUT FEATUrE, AllEZ, EDDy!

tHe bIcycle tReAt TExT geoFFRey mAcnAb

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porTrAiT bARt dewAele

‘certainly, in Belgium, Eddy merckx was a super-hero,’ Embrechts declares. ‘he was a perfect human being, as perfect as can be.’

Allez, Eddy! takes place in 1975, when the Belgian cyclist was at his peak… but also the year when he lost the Tour de France for the first time. The setting is a small provincial town. The main character is Freddy, a shy and repressed ginger-haired 11-year-old boy who suffers from incontinence and whose mother cossets him. his room at the top of the house is a shrine to merckx. Freddy has his own bike, suspended by ropes from the ceiling so that he can recreate his hero’s greatest rides. modernity is encroaching. Freddy’s dad has a butcher’s shop and is terrified that the big new supermarket will steal away all his custom. however, to mark the opening of the supermarket, a special race has been planned. The winner will get to meet… merckx himself! Even though the father hates the supermarket, he secretly signs up Freddy for the race. This is a rites of passage story. not only does Freddy

need to take a step from childhood and fantasy into the grown-up world… his village has to adjust to a new age. is the story autobiographical? not exactly, Embrechts explains. he grew up in a city. however, on a symbolic level, the film chimes with certain events in his own life growing up in Antwerp. he came from a family of teachers. his mother ran a shop. ‘But I wanted to make films.’ His relatives were perplexed by his ambitions. he escaped to art school in Brussels having first trained up as an electrician.‘I had to pay for my studies myself which was a disadvantage but also an advantage. I had to work from the first day I went to school.’

ambitious budget The director, already well into his 40s, has extensive experience as an assistant on such films as Peter Greenaway’s 8 ½ Women and Frank Van passel’s manneken pis. The years as an assistant-director in Belgium and The netherlands

were hardly wasted time. however, he eventually took the ‘leap of faith’ and began to direct himself, making primarily TV series and documentaries. he also made two shorts, one of them the award-winning Vincent (2001). it was at that point that he decided to work on his first feature. ‘It’s been a long process,’ he sighs ruefully.

Embrechts credits his stint at the Binger institute in Amsterdam with helping him finally lick his feature screenplay into shape. in the years that his Allez, Eddy! was edging toward the start line, he also wrote other screenplays, one of them being the script for box office hit stricken, which got made in 2009 by reinout oerlemans.

Allez, Eddy! is far more ambitious in budget and scope than the typical Flemish debut. it cost around ˆ 3,5 million; had a large cast and was bold enough to recreate mid70s Belgium in its minutest period detail. Embrechts was lucky in having a very resourceful and experienced Dutch producer, Jacqueline de goeij, who also happened to be his wife. she was used to working with young directors

who were still ‘willing to see and to learn and to explore new possibilities.’ One of her films, Zus & zo, was oscarnominated for Best Foreign language Film.

Barbara Sarafian The writer-director realized at the outset that casting was crucial. Without the right Freddy, Allez, Eddy! wouldn’t get out of first gear. This wasn’t an easy part to play. A neurotic, bed-wetting youngster with a highly vivid imagination is a huge stretch for an inexperienced actor.

‘We knew in advance that if our main character of the 11-year-old didn’t play well, we would have no movie.’

To the filmmakers’ amazement, more than 5000 children applied for the part of Freddy. From that 5000, Embrechts and his team chose 600 to audition. This was then narrowed down to 50 and then to 5… and finally to two.

They knew what they wanted. ‘must be very vulnerable but also athletic. preferably with red hair.’

The child they eventually chose, Jelte Blommaert, had

Allez, Eddy!

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his own days as an assistant-director. ‘most heads of department i knew and had worked with before.’

The film was shot on digitally, using the Arri Alexa Raw. The quality and resolution, Embrechts believes, were as good as with 35mm. ‘Also, working with a child, i was very glad not to have the stress of having only so many feet of film a day. i’d start the camera running and sometimes i waited two or three minutes before i said “action.”’

Eddy Merckx

attention deficit disorder and took pills. No, he wasn’t easy to work with. however, with patient coaching, Embrechts was able to coax out an exceptional performance from him.

‘At first, it was my problem more than his. When you talked to him, it seemed that his attention was wandering everywhere.

But I noticed after five or six days that everything I said, he took in… once you really trust him and talk to him, he gets it. he plays very much in the moment.’ it helped that the child actor was surrounded by experienced professionals. his father was played by peter Van den Begin.

His mother was Barbara Sarafian, an actress who has become an international name thanks to her performance in moscow, Belgium.

The link between Sarafian and Embrechts stretched back more than a decade to when they had been the only Flemish-speaking Belgians on the set of greenaway’s 8 ½ Women. ‘We found each other on that set because we could say something without other people understanding it.’

Embrechts enthuses about Sarafian’s performance, pointing to the subtle and sensitive way she performs for the camera. ‘it’s amazing! if the camera does something, she knows exactly where to be with her looks and how to play with the other actor. she is not only a very good actress: she’s a very good movie actress – and that is an unusual gift.’

When it came to putting together the crew, that was very straightforward. Embrechts had plentiful contacts from

Unlike many other novice debut directors, Embrechts had been around movie sets for so long that he wasn’t daunted at all when the time came to call ‘action’ on the first day of shooting. ‘i was not stressed on the set. i said, oK, we have to work and get the maximum out of the time we have and the people we have but that was it.’ his challenge was to ensure that the actors and crew could bring that extra dimension to the script he had spent so many years working on.

Although the film lovingly recreates the provincial Belgium

of the 1970s, Embrechts was careful not to over-do the sideburns, fat ties and big lapels or to indulge in typical 70s nostalgic cliché. Instead, he wanted the film to have a timeless quality. ‘The village was an isolated place far from Brussels. i said to costume and make-up to make it as

nter view i timeless as possible.’

When you see the film, you think at first it may be set in the 40s or 50s. it’s only when Eddy merckx is shown racing to triumph or when the boy goes to the big city with his father that audiences will realize that they really are in the mid1970s.

Was merckx involved? not directly, Embrechts explains. however, the former cycling champ is aware of the project. he replied politely to an email Embrechts sent him but hasn’t tried to interfere. ‘he must know. he’s not the lead character in the film and the film is not about his life. It’s about a little boy.’ The director intends to invite merckx to the premiere and is optimistic that he will come.

full-time So what next? Embrechts is rushing to finish Allez, Eddy! in time for its march release date. it may have taken him until middle-age to make his first feature (he is now 48) but he is determined now to make further films. One new project with the national Theatre of ghent is provisionally called '4 ½', about ‘five different relationships which could be one relationship.’ he is also working on a war-themed screenplay for Bos Bros. now, Embrechts states emphatically, he is a full-time writer and director… he doesn’t have time for anything else. 

Allez, Eddy!

www.flandersimage.com www.cridecoeur.be

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Š imageglobe

From left to right: Shelter producers Tim Van Aelst, Katrien Van Nieuwenhove and Tom Baetens at the International Emmy Awards in New York.

tHe mAn WhO proDUcEr AnD DirEcTor Tim VAn AElsT WAs plAying A hUnch WhEn hE chosE An English TiTlE For comEDy sEriEs BEniDorm BAsTArDs. 'i FigUrED ThAT iT hAD poTEnTiAl, BUT i nEVEr ThoUghT iT WoUlD BEcomE This Big,' hE sAys. 'Big' is AlmosT An UnDErsTATEmEnT. in 2010 iT Won ThE golDEn rosE AT ThE rosE D'or TV FEsTiVAl in lUcErnE, WiTh An inTErnATionAl Emmy For BEsT comEDy FolloWing in 2011. ThE FormAT hAs solD To nEArly 30 TErriToriEs, inclUDing ThE UsA WhErE iT is BEing rEmADE As BETTy WhiTE's oFF ThEir rocKErs. TExT IAn mundell

This was not what Van Aelst expected when he set up shelter in 2009 to make small comedy series. 'We never had the ambition of conquering the world or of becoming a big company. We just wanted to make shows that made us laugh and that we wanted to see on TV.' The first was man liberation Front, a studio format in which two hosts challenge men to resist pressure to be sensitive and caring 'new men' and reconnect with their more basic natures. 'it's a very ballsy comedy show about men in this new kind of society,' says Van Aelst. it ran for two series and was successfully exported to the netherlands.

SKI generation it was after this that Van Aelst had the idea for Benidorm Bastards, a comedy show featuring old people behaving badly in real-life situations. it began with an article about target groups, which pointed out that big

nter view i

advertisers were no longer interested in people over 55 years old. 'That got me,' Van Aelst recalls. 'i thought: dammit, that's why i should make those people rock 'n' roll.'

And, considering his own 60-something parents, he thought the marketing people were wrong.

'They spend money like crazy - i call them the sKi generation: spending their Kids' inheritance and it's weird that no-one is targeting them.' casting around for a format, he was inspired by the candid camera approach. 'old people are quite often the victims in those jokes because they are so easy to prank, so i thought: what if we switch it around and get old people pranking kids. not actors, but real old people.' it was also a chance to improve on the formula, which Van Aelst felt was dated. 'We always thought that candid camera jokes were way too long and became boring after a while. We wanted to have a punch line, boom, then get out of there.'

They wrote some gags and went out onto the streets to shoot them using a small video camera.

'From day one we saw the potential. We showed it to people and everyone was cracking up,' Van Aelst recalls. And while it brings old people to the fore, there is still a connection to the youth market. 'Although it's old people pranking kids, there are so many kids in the show. Everybody liked it from the start.'

What If? in 2010 the format was picked up by sales agent sevenone international and the deals started to mount up. By the end of 2011 it had sold to 27 countries, including the uS where it is being made

by Kinetic content for nBc, with Van Aelst as executive producer. in the Us the format has been changed slightly, with the introduction of a host in the shape of Betty White, star of the cult series The golden girls. A host will also be brought in for the UK, where the series is being made for the BBc, and Australia. Van Aelst is not entirely convinced this is a good idea. 'Time will tell whether they are right or wrong to do that,' he says. 'i'm still doubtful. i don't

PRANkED ThE WORLD What if not everything was permitted in war time?

Benidorm Bastards

What if the Internet was invented earlier?

What If ?

think that it will scare off viewers, but i think that it takes away a lot of the show's ballsiness.' shelter's follow up to Benidorm Bastards is something different again, a fast comedy sketch show that begins with the question 'What if...?' For example, what if Barbie was a real woman?

What if the Titanic never sank? What if butchers were like rock stars? it was a conscious decision not to repeat the Benidorm formula. 'We tried to make the best sketch show ever, the sketch show that we wanted to see.'

After a first series in Belgium, What if? has already been picked up in the netherlands, where it is being remade for a prime-time, saturday night slot on rTl 4. shelter has been closely involved in producing the show, and Van Aelst will be watching its progress closely. 'This first country is so important, because that proves whether or not the format can travel,' he says. 'it's looking good, but beating Benidorm Bastards is something else. That's going to be a tough one.' ď Š

www.flandersimage.tv www.shelter.tv

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HiGH HeeLs, low tIde TExT IAn mundell

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porTrAiT bARt dewAele

WriTEr-DirEcTor ilsE somErs ADmiTs To hAVing mixED FEElings ABoUT hEr proFEssion. 'i'VE AlWAys hAD This loVE-hATE rElATionship WiTh Film, BEcAUsE iT is so hArD To FinD yoUr WAy AnD gET yoUr proJEcTs mADE,' shE sAys. ForTUnATEly, ThE loVE hAs proVED sTrongEr ThAn ThE hATE AnD somErs is ABoUT To complETE

sEAsiDE rEnDEZ-VoUs, hEr FirsT FEATUrE For ThE Big scrEEn.

it's easy to understand somers' ambiguous relationship with filmmaking once you hear something of her career.

After training as an assistant director in Brussels in the early 1980s, she went to new york to take a masters degree in film at Columbia university. This was meant to be a stepping stone into the uS film industry, but just as she was completing her first assignments the Gulf War broke out, the industry contracted and the work dried up.

For a while she split her time between production jobs in Belgium and writing in new york, but this soon became

untenable and she returned permanently to Europe. in 1994 she began teaching screenwriting at the RITS film school in Brussels, and in 1997 completed a successful short film, sancta mortale, about a young girl living in an old people's home who has vivid religious fantasies.

This was followed in 1999 by film for Dutch television, cowboy uit iran, about a refugee who befriends two apparently stray dogs on the beach, and through them finds an adoptive family.

nter view i red light district Despite these promising developments, her own feature projects refused to take off. But she took comfort in the increasing amount of work coming her way as a script consultant. 'i thought, if i can't direct then i'll write, and from then on i did a lot of writing.'

Even though this included two relatively successful features directed by rudi Van Den Bossche, olivetti 82 (2001) and The Dark Diamond (2004), it was frustrating not to be able to put her own vision on the screen. Eventually she decided to do something completely different. 'i lived in the red light district in Antwerp and i was offered a job restarting social networking in my neighbourhood. i thought: that's a challenge, I'll leave all this film behind.'

The break was not complete, however. she kept on teaching and occasionally helped other filmmakers polish dialogue or shape their scripts. 'And after four years i really really missed it. i knew i had to go back.' somers had also started a family, which provided the inspiration for her

short film iVF (2007) about women's experience of fertility treatment. she also dusted off an old project from her student days. 'A friend said: why don't you make seaside rendez-Vous? It's such an easy film to make, it's a small movie, it's a funny movie. it shouldn't be too hard.'

That was slightly optimistic. A grant from the Flanders Audiovisual Fund (VAF) allowed somers to develop the script at the north by northwest workshop, but it still took five years to secure the funding. Even so, the situation seems to be better now than it was when she first tried to get a feature underway. 'i think it has become much easier for producers than it was before the Tax shelter,' she says, referring to Belgium's tax break for audiovisual productions. 'Many more films are made now.'

As well as VAF funding and input from the Tax shelter, seaside rendez-Vous has also won support from Flemish commercial broadcaster VTm. it will be part of the next Faits Divers series, which in the past has included films such as moscow, Belgium and happy Together.

Seaside Rendez-Vous

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Seaside Rendez-Vous

career vs. family The film concerns four women approaching their thirties who have a weekend reunion at the house by the sea where they used to spend their summers as teenagers. 'But they have too many secrets from one another, and the secrets keep them from really being friends,' somers explains. 'Actually, the secrets ruin the whole weekend and it ends up being a little chaotic.'

The original idea came from thinking about the friends somers left behind when she went to study in the UsA in her twenties. The passing years have only deepened her interest in the theme. 'it has a lot to do with the nostalgic ideas you have about friendship,' she explains. 'When you are good friends you are driven by a feeling for the "old days" or maybe a memory of one moment. When you see that friend after 10 or 20 years, you experience the same feeling and that makes you think that you are still friends.'

After so much time, somers considers these things with a certain detachment. 'now i look very differently on issues such as career versus family, or friends versus family. now i can laugh about it, because it's all over!' however, they were a little closer to home for her four actresses: Eline Kuppens, maaike neuville, marieke Dilles and Ellen schoeters. 'For them it touched real experiences,'

somers says, before conceding that this was no bad thing for the film. 'I wanted it to be played with a certain integrity, and because of their experiences they really brought that in.

They really dug into the characters.'

These personal connections came out in a week-long rehearsal period that somers organised on the set before shooting started. 'That was crucial to the project because it allowed us to see if the tension between the characters was right,' she says. 'i had to shoot in 20 days, so i knew that there would be no time on the set to really go into discussions.'

Even so, some issues would not go away. 'The discussions often started up again on set,' she recalls. 'some things bring up a never-ending discussion. it evolves and you start thinking, but there was no time to really do that. That was sometimes a little frustrating, but we had to move forward.'

rethink friendships The tight time constraint was somers' main concern, and with four characters in play it was sometimes challenging to get all the shots she wanted. 'It's an actors' film,' she says. 'it's carried by the performers, and you can't ask actors just to jump and take on a role. They need time to be and to create.'

This heightened the tensions that are inherent in filming a comedy. 'i knew what i wanted but i was scared it would not come out, that i would get into the editing room and be stuck with scenes that were not funny at all,' somers recalls. 'But now i'm very happy. it all works.'

Producer Viviane Vanfleteren was a great support, both during filming and at the editing stage. 'she gives you a lot of freedom to do what you want, but if there are problems, then she is there for you,' says somers. it's also clear that the location they chose, in ostend, was just right for the story. ‘The east side is all under development, and that's a nice metaphor for what happens to the women. They have to rethink their friendships.'

Although seaside rendez-Vous is only just completed, somers already has another script under way. 'it's about a birth mother, an adopted son and adoptive parents who are looking for each other,' she says. called Addis Ababa, it will involve filming in Flanders and the Ethiopian capital. 'it's a very personal story, because i adopted a son who comes from Addis Ababa,' she explains. in fact, the story is so close to her heart that she almost abandoned seaside rendez-Vous to devote all her energy to writing it. 'But i thought: i've fought so long for this story that I'm not going to let go of it now. I'm going to fight until I make it! i also wanted to start small before making something more complicated and more profound.'ď Š www.flandersimage.com www.seasiderendezvousthemovie.com www.vivifilm.be

Generation F All the time Ilse Somers was fighting to get her scripts into production she was teaching at RITS in Brussels and at other film schools in Flanders.

That inevitably meant seeing some of her students make it onto the big screen before her.

'When I started teaching 17 years ago they were more or less competitors, but not any more,' she says. 'now i can just enjoy what they bring to class and help them move forward.' her current role at riTs, which she has no plans to abandon, involves mentoring students as they take their first steps as filmmakers. 'I really enjoy working with young directors and developing their short films. it's nice to see how people change over the time they are here.' she also admires their work, both at the school and after they leave. 'This new generation of directors grew up with television and a culture of images, and they have a certain fluency. I'm sometimes jealous of that.' however, she can't be persuaded to give examples of the students who have most impressed her. 'There is too much talent to answer with a few names!'

Seaside Rendez-Vous

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Vincent Bal Text Ian Mundell

PORTRAIT BART DEWAELE

The cast of Vincent Bal's latest film, The Zig Zag Kid, knows about his taste in movies. 'At the end of the shoot I gave each of the actors a DVD of a film that had really touched me,' he explains.

'Among them were The Apartment, To Be Or Not To Be - I gave that to Isabella Rossellini - and H么tel du Nord by Marcel Carn茅.

These old films are from so long ago but you can see that they are about people. It's the story of the characters that touches you. They are so well-written, so well-made. Timeless, in a way.'

His first short film after school was a film noir spoof called The Bloody olive (1996). he followed this with two feature films for kids, man of steel (1999) and minoes (2001). his influences are not easy to spot in these films, he says. 'There are a lot of references that only i know. it's more about atmosphere and tone rather than wanting to do a particular shot.

I'm not such as technical filmmaker, I'm not struck by how the images are made but by the feeling they generate.'

That was the appeal of David grossman's novel 'The Zig Zag Kid', which he began working on in 2004. 'The images in the book are so strong,' he says. 'it's very romantic, very funny, and has an adventure story as well, with a lot of layers. But there is pain and melancholy too.'

The story concerns a young boy, nono, who is sent off to see his uncle for a pre-Bar mitzvah lecture. Behind this boring journey there is a surprise organised by his father, but it misfires and Nono is drawn into an adventure that, in the film, stretches from the Netherlands, through Belgium to the south of France.

Bal thinks the film will appeal to all ages. 'You can follow the child's story, but you can follow the adults' story as well, so i think there is something in it for everybody.' it's not so easy to think of other films that have this dual appeal. 'I remember watching Amarcord by Fellini when i was a kid, and i really loved it,' Bal says. 'As a child i could totally relate to it, but it's not a children's film.'

After The Zig Zag Kid, Bal has a choice of other projects to pursue. There is Brabançonne, a musical set against Belgium's linguistic divide that he has been working on with pierre De clercq, the writer of come As you Are. Then there is The substitute, a dark romantic comedy based on a comic book by lewis Trondheim, and Wiplala, a children's film based on a book by Annie m.g. schmidt, the author behind minoes.

BooKs Maigret Mysteries, by Georges Simenon, with vintage Dick Bruna covers

nfluence

Even though cinema has changed since these films were made, Bal thinks lessons can still be learned from them. 'The rhythm may be different but the emotions are the same,' he says. 'I think you can also get something from the tone. In Billy Wilder's films, for example, there's a combination of sarcasm and a sort of romance. it's like yin and yang. if it's only romance, it gets sappy, so you need a bit of the sarcasm to make it real and gritty. i really like that combination.'

Bal first came into contact with the films of Wilder, Ernst Lubitsch and other classic directors through watching TV when he was growing up in ghent. he was also touched by more modern films. 'I'm a child of the eighties, so films like Back to the Future were really important, but i also discovered Woody Allen, and that was an eye-opener for me because i really loved the humour,' he says. 'Then, when i was 18, i discovered peter greenaway, which was a totally different kind of cinema and very visual. i loved Drowning By numbers.'

Even so, this interest in cinema didn't add up to a vocation. 'A friend said he was going to film school, and I thought: sure, why not? But it's not like I dreamt of being a filmmaker when I was a child.' The turning point came when he failed his third year at the Sint Lukas film school in Brussels, and he had to decide whether or not to carry on. 'i decided that i really liked it and i really wanted to do it. That was a big decision for me.' re-sitting the year also turned out to be a good learning experience. he had already covered the theory, so he spent his time haunting the Film museum in Brussels, revisiting directors such as Wilder and lubitsch. 'From that point on i found my voice and my joy in making films,' he recalls. 'In film school I always got the feeling that I had to be serious, and that's just not my forte.'

these are some of the works vincent Bal currently gets inspired by:

i

unDer tHe inFLuenCe

iNSPiRATiONAL

MuSiC Flight of the Conchords

COMiC STRiP Polina, by Bastien Vivès

DvD Round Midnight (1986),

by Bertrand Tavernier

FiLM Restless (2011),

by Gus Van Sant

sHorts Green Porno,

by Isabella Rossellini

PhOTOgRAPhy Saul Leiter

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come As you Are at the Arras Film Festival, November 2011.

Standing, from left to right: producer Mariano Van Hoof, jury president Claude Lelouch, screenwriter Pierre De Clercq, director Geoffrey Enthoven, actors Gilles De Schryver and Isabelle De Hertogh. Seated: Asta Philpot, whose story inspired the filmmakers.

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Come As You Are

i am in this multiplex at the montreal World Film Festival. While i am waiting to go to a master class i’m giving, i decide to go into one of the cinemas at random. A film is starting and I have no idea what I am about to see. nothing out of the ordinary up to now.

As i sit down in my seat, i am totally oblivious to the fact that it is about to roll away and that i am going to be thrown into the world of those people for whom i rarely spare a second thought. But it is the exact opposite that happens: I find a blind man staring at me through the screen of my prejudices.

I have rarely got such a kick out of discovering a film that was so completely unexpected. come As you Are is an audacious film. As it unfolds, one question keeps nagging me: how can such a risky subject as physical disability be so aptly dealt with? I fall in love with it. It is love at first sight.

This unassuming film is like no other. It has all the virtues of a great film. Its characters have me laughing one minute and crying the next, transforming the viewer that i am into a bipolar state while remaining perfectly lucid.

By the end of what is, in many ways, a coming-of-age road movie, i am humming the film’s song, 'Et si tu n’existais pas' ('And if You Didn’t Exist'), with the characters. And as i get up from my seat, i say to myself that, thankfully, they do exist. And that i have an urgent desire to shout ‘hasta la vista’ from the rooftops!

The next day, i learn that other people have been on the same journey: the film won the festival’s Grand Prize of the Americas, the Audience Award as well as the Ecumenical Jury Award. 

 Claude Lelouch and Les Films 13 are to release come As you Are (under its original title, hasta la vista) in France on 7 March.

The film will make its market debut at this year’s European Film Market, through sales agent Films Boutique.

TAKE 22 | spring 2012 |  3.99 cover Anemone Valcke by Bart Dewaele crEDiTs Editor christian De schutter Deputy Editor + Art Direction nathalie capiau Deputy Editor / Digital Karel Verhelst sub editors John Adair, An ratinckx contributors lisa Bradshaw, geoffrey macnab, Karl meersman, ian mundell, henry Womersley photo credits p 7 © Family Film - Minds Meet 2011; p 14 © Kristien clerinx - prime Time; p 26 © Alexander Decommere - Eyeworks; p 45 © vtm; p 46-47 © kris Dewitte; p 48-49 © nyk Dekeyser All other stills copyrighted by the respective producers Design

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